Comic Downloading Survey Results

Introduction:

From Tuesday, November 30th, 2004 to Tuesday December 14th, 2004 I took a survey about comic book downloading and scanning. This is to my knowledge the first survey into this field of interest.

I spread the news about this survey through various popular message boards. Among them: Talk @ Newsarama, Comicon.com message boards, Comics Journal Message Board, Brian K Vaughan forum, Joe Szilagyi Delphi Forum, Andy Diggle Delphi Forum, Superlime Delphi Forum, Joe Quesada Forum, Dwayne McDuffie Delphi Forum, Micah Wright Delphi Forum, Larry Young Delphi Forum and Isotope Delphi Forum. The mods at the Mark Millar Forum deleted my message about the survey.

I also went to the source of some of the downloading and scanning. I posted a link to the survey on a very popular bittorrent site that specializes in comic books (they wish to remain anonymous). As well, I visited some IRC channels frequented by people that regularly download through a variety of methods (mainly Newsgroups, but also IRC and DC++), and from there the word spread. I did not join DC++ hubs and advertise as virtually all of them have no advertising rules. The same goes for specific IRC channels that distribute scanned comics. Nonetheless, I got about 118 people involved in downloading or scanning to take the survey.

The purpose of the survey is to shed some light on the effects of scanning and downloading comics. I did not do it to justify or condemn those involved. Simply put, scanning and downloading has been going on for quite some time. When the subject of this gets brought up there are a variety of responses. Some people think it has very little effect on the comic industry, some fear a music industry like crash. While this survey is unscientific and doesn't provide concrete answers, it does provide some insight to popular methods of distribution, what comics are being distributed by popularity, changing buying habits of those involved and more.

On to the results:

Total Responses: Downloaders: 81 (71%) Scanners: 37 (29%) Total: 118

1. How do you get your Comic Book Scans?
(users picked more than one)
Downloaders Scanners Total
A) Bittorrent 68 (65%) 13 (23%) 81 (50%)
B) DC++ 14 (13%) 7 (12%) 21 (13%)
C) Peer to Peer programs (Kazaa, etc..) 5 (5%) 5 (9%) 10 (6%)
D) Usenet Newsgroups 4 (4%) 14 (25%) 18 (11%)
E) IRC 7 (7%) 14 (25%) 21 (13%)
F) Legal Promotional versions on Websites
(Marvel.com, etc..)
6 (6%) 4 (7%) 10 (6%)
Total 104 57 161

This was originally two questions, the 2nd being "Which method do you get the majority of them from?" Some people answered one and not the other so I combined the answers to give a better picture of which method is more popular for downloading.

Of odd note: somebody wrote in that they get their comic scans from CD Roms. There are legal ones for sale, but there are also illegal ones on ebay, which of the two the person was getting they didn't say.

2. How old are the comics you download and
roughly what percent fall into each category?
0 to 25% 26 to 50% 50 to 75% 75 to 100% Total
A) Less than 3 months old 59 8 4 6 77 (13%)
B) 3 Months to 1 Year old 64 6 0 1 71 (12%)
C) 1 Year to 5 Years old 68 14 1 4 87 (14%)
D) 1990's Comics 64 24 1 1 90 (15%)
E) 1980's Comics 65 16 2 1 84 (14%)
F) 1970's Comics 59 8 0 0 67 (11%)
G) 1960's Comics 51 7 0 0 58 (10%)
H) 1950's Comics 37 1 0 0 38 (6%)
I) 1930-1940's Comics 27 3 0 2 32 (5%)
Total494 (82%)87 (14%)8 (1%)15 (2%)604

These are the combined results. There are some very minor differences between how downloaders and scanners spread out their collection. You can read them here.

3. What type of comic books do you download?
(Again, say Yes to all that apply).
Downloaders Scanners Total
A) Superhero Comics from Marvel 36 (19%) 15 (20%) 36 (19%)
B) Superhero Comics from DC 23 (21%) 14 (19%) 37 (20%)
C) Non Superhero Comics from Marvel and DC
(Vertigo, Trouble, etc..)
18 (16%) 12 (16%) 30 (16%)
D) Superhero Comics from Wildstorm, Image,
Dark Horse, & Other publishers
17 (15%) 9 (12%) 26 (14%)
E) Non Superhero Comic Books from smaller publishers 16 (14%) 10 (14%) 26 (14%)
F) Manga 7 (6%) 4 (5%) 11 (6%)
G) European 4 (4%) 5 (7%) 9 (5%)
H) 1960s/1970s Underground comics 6 (5%) 5 (7%) 11 (6%)
Total 112 74 186

Some stats I found particularly interesting was:

Superheroes: 53% Non Superheroes: 47%
Marvel & DC: 55% Everybody else: 45%

Most comic book stores are pretty slanted towards superheroes and Marvel and DC in particular. It appears that downloaders are using the free system to get comics they don't typically buy or see.

4. Do you download individual issues or Graphic Novels? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) Individual Issues only. 9 (20%) 8 (27%) 17 (23%)
B) I try to get complete runs of individual issues. 21 (48%) 12 (40%) 33 (45%)
C) I download Graphic Novels. 14 (32%) 10 (33%) 24 (32%)
Total 44 30 74

5. What do you do with the scans that you downloaded? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) Burn them to disk. 7 (20%) 8 (42%) 15 (28%)
B) Read them and delete them. 9 (26%) 1 (5%) 10 (19%)
C) Keep them on my Hard drive. 17 (49%) 9 (47%) 26 (48%)
D) Other (please specify) 2 (6%)1 (5%)3 (6%)
Total 35 19 54

Written in answers:

All of the above, depends on the comics... Those i didn't like I'll delete, complete runs I'll burn.
Read them, then burn them to a CD, then i delete them.
Currently mostly on CDs, but that will change when I get a new computer with much larger space
Read then burn to disk
Keep them & maybe edit them with Photoshop @ a later date to improve quality
when i started i would burn them all, now i just read and delete
Read them and burn them to disk
Read and delete ones I don't own, Burn off ones I own so I don't have to dig out the issues

5a. Roughly how many of the comic books you download do you read? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) 0-5% 3 (4%) 2 (6%) 5 (5%)
B) 5-10% 4 (5%) 2 (6%) 6 (6%)
C) 10-20%3 (4%)5 (16%)8 (8%)
D) 20-50%14 (19%)6 (19%)20 (19%)
E) 50-80%17 (23%)8 (26%)25 (24%)
F) 80-100%33 (45%)8 (26%)41 (39%)
Total7431105

Scanners don't read as many of the comics as they download. Perhaps because they're reading the comics they scan?

6. Do you download comics/TPBs that you are currently buying? Downloaders Scanners Total
Yes38 (48%)22 (63%)60 (52%)
No42 (53%)13 (37%)55 (48%)
Total8035115

Interesting that the majority of scanners still buy what they're downloading, while a narrow margin of downloaders don't.

7. Have you ever bought a comic book or Graphic Novel because
of something you downloaded? (Again, say yes to all that apply)
Downloaders Scanners Total
A) A comic book9 (20%)9 (27%)18 (23%)
B) Comic book run (3 issues+)15 (33%)7 (21%)22 (28%)
C) A TPB15 (33%)11 (33%)26 (33%)
D) I never bought anything I downloaded7 (15%)6 (18%)13 (16%)
Total463379

Downloaders appear to pick up more series, vs. scanners that don't buy anything.

Downloaders Scanners Total
7a: If so, how many comics approximately?1761 1101 2862
7b: How many TPBs?345154499

Note: For this question I chose the most conservative number. If somebody said 20-30, I used 20. So the numbers you see here are minimums and are possibly higher.

Also Note: Some people wrote in word responses instead of numbers, they couldn't be accurately included with the tally.
For Comics responses were: Thousands, Everything I loved
For TPBs: Hundreds, Loads, a lot

8. Where did you buy the comic(s)/TPB(s)? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) Local Comic Shop17 (37%)10 (45%)27 (40%)
B) Book store10 (22%)2 (9%)12 (18%)
C) Online Mail Order10 (22%)3 (14%)13 (19%)
D) Auction Site5 (11%)3 (14%)8 (12%)
E) Newsstand2 (4%)2 (9%)4 (6%)
F) Other (please specify)2 (4%)2 (9%)4 (6%)
Total462268

Others include: convention, my own comic shop that I started because of downloading, Ebay, Swap with other collectors, I don't buy comics anymore (scanning has nothing to do with this, I haven't bought them in about 5 years because of money issues), Comicons.

9. Have you dropped any subscriptions to
comic books because you are reading them online?
Downloaders Scanners Total
Yes10 (12%)1 (3%)11 (9%)
No74 (88%)33 (97%)107 (91%)
Total8434118

Scanners remain remarkably loyal to the books they're buying. But that could be because they intend to scan them.

Downloaders Scanners Total
9a. If so, how many titles?14115

10. Have you ever decided to not buy a TPB because you could download it? Downloaders Scanners Total
Yes8 (10%)9 (26%)17 (15%)
No70 (90%)26 (74%)96 (85%)
Total7835113

Downloaders Scanners Total
10b. Roughly how many TPBs did you skip on buying? 11484198

11. When did you start downloading Comic Books? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) Under 6 Months ago 26 (33%)8 (22%)34 (29%)
B) Under a Year Ago 26 (33%)5 (14%)31 (27%)
C) Under 2 years 18 (23%)9 (24%)27 (23%)
D) Under 4 years 6 (8%)6 (16%)12 (10%)
E) Longer than 4 years 3 (4%)9 (24%)12 (10%)
Total 7937116

A group of scanners seemed to have started this, and every two years a new batch of scanners join the fray.

12. How many comic books have you downloaded? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) A Few3 (4%)1 (3%)4 (3%)
B) Under 201 (1%)1 (3%)2 (2%)
C) Under 1005 (6%)0 (0%)5 (4%)
D) Between 100 - 2006 (8%)2 (5%)8 (7%)
E) Under 2 Burned CD worth.0 (0%)0 (0%)0 (0%)
F) 2-10 Burned CD's worth11 (14%)3 (8%)14 (12%)
G) 10-20 Burned CD's worth12 (15%)2 (5%)14 (12%)
H) 20-100 Burned CD's worth15 (19%)10 (27%)25 (22%)
I) 100-250 Burned CD's worth5 (6%)3 (8%)8 (7%)
J) 250-500 Burned CD's worth2 (3%)3 (8%)5 (4%)
K) 500+7 (9%)5 (14%)12 (10%)
Or:
A) 1 Full Burned DVDs worth0 (0%)0 (0%)0 (0%)
B) 2-5 Burned DVDs worth 1 (1%)4 (11%)5 (4%)
C) 5-10 Burned DVDs worth5 (6%)1 (3%)6 (5%)
D) 10+ Burned DVDs worth6 (8%)2 (5%)8 (7%)
Total7937116

13. Roughly what percentage of these would be the illegal scanned types? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) 0-10%2 (3%)1 (3%)3 (3%)
B) 10-25%1 (1%)2 (6%)3 (3%)
C) 25-50%0 (0%)2 (6%)2 (2%)
D) 50-75% 5 (7%)4 (11%)9 (8%)
E) 75-90%7 (9%)2 (6%)9 (8%)
F) 90-100%59 (80%)25 (69%)84 (76%)
Total7436110

14. Where did you learn about downloading Comic Books? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) Message Board6 (21%)6 (30%)12 (24%)
B) Search Engine7 (24%)1 (5%)8 (16%)
C) Word of Mouth5 (17%)3 (15%)8 (16%)
D) A News column/website2 (7%)1 (5%)3 (6%)
E) Online Chat0 (0%)5 (25%)5 (10%)
F) Other (please specify)9 (31%)4 (20%)13 (27%)
Total292049

Other answers included: found the newsgroup by browsing (5), Newsgroups (2), SuprNova (3), IRC user (2), accidentally found them on emule, downloading site, randomly saw it, Random Kazaa search, Found it on a website, I just thought to, By downloading other material, a bittorrent site, Live Journal, just saw they were available on BitTorrent sites, andy diggle message board, purely by accident (long story) I was looking for comicbook covers!!!!, Stumbled upon the NNTP Groups and found out about bittorrent.

What Age group are you in? Downloaders Scanners Total
A) 5-10 Years old1 (1%)0 (0%)1 (1%)
B) 10-150 (0%)0 (0%)0 (0%)
C) 15-2017 (21%)3 (8%)20 (17%)
D) 20-2528 (35%)11 (30%)39 (33%)
E) 25-3015 (19%)9 (24%)24 (21%)
F) 30-3511 (14%)4 (11%)15 (13%)
G) 35-405 (6%)4 (11%)9 (8%)
H) 40-452 (3%)1 (3%)3 (3%)
I) 45-501 (1%)2 (5%)3 (3%)
J) 50-550 (0%)2 (5%)2 (2%)
K) 55+0 (0%)1 (3%)1 (1%)
Total8037117

The above question was asked twice, within the scanners only section and downloaders only section. I've combined the results for easy comparison.


These are the Scanners only questions. The 1st question was "1. Have you ever Scanned a Comic Book or TPB?"
We got 37 people saying yes.

2. What Age of comic books do you scan, and
roughly by what percentage? (Say Yes to all that apply)
0 to 2526 to 5050 to 7575 to 100TotalNo
Percent
A) Under 3 months old 30003 (8%)4
B) Comics between 3 months and 1 Year old 30003 (8%)2
C) Comics between 1 and 5 years old 30104 (11%)3
D) 1990s Comics700310 (27%)4
E) 1980s Comics20002 (5%)5
F) 1970s Comics50005 (14%)2
G) 1960s Comics22004 (11%)2
H) 1950s Comics21104 (11%)0
I) 1930's - 1940s Comics20002 (5%)1
Total29 (78%)3 (8%)2 (5%)3 (8%)3723

No Percent means people that indicated what they scanned, without giving a percentage. In D, they would just type D and nothing more.

3. What age of TPBs do you scan, and roughly by what percentage?
(Again, say Yes to all that apply)
Amount
A) Under 3 months old 1 (8%)
B) Between 3 months and 1 Year old1 (8%)
C) Between 1 and 5 years old3 (23%)
D) 1990s TPBs4 (31%)
E) 1980s TPBs3 (23%)
F) 1970s TPBs1 (8%)
Total13

4. Do you tend to devote yourself to a specific publisher? Amount
Yes5 (14%)
No31 (86%)
Total36

4a. If Yes, which one?
Marvel (2) Dark Horse, DC, Dell

5. Do you tend to devote yourself to a specific Genre (Superheroes, Underground, etc.)? Amount
Yes11 (31%)
No25 (69%)
Total36

5a. If yes, which one?
6 Superheroes, 1 Starwars, 1 Underground books, 1 rare underground or 80s/90s hard-to find superheroes, 1 Comedy, 1 Superheroes / Fantasy.

6. Why do you scan comic books? Amount
A) To help complete Runs7 (29%)
B) To Share the Comics I love8 (33%)
C) So I will have an digital archive of my collection6 (25%)
D) Other:3 (13%)
Total24

Other answers were:
give back a little (when i can) to the community, I find it a very relaxing hobby, So that guys can read and sample comics they may otherwise never have heard of or can not access anymore.

7. If a publisher or creator specifically said they didn't
want their books scanned, would you stop scanning them?
PublisherCreator
Yes12 (34%)23 (68%)
No23 (66%)11 (32%)
Total3534

The majority appears to respect creators more than they do publishers.

The Following Question Has Been Removed:

8. Do you think scanning comic books will harm the comic book industry?

I asked this and later on realized my HTML code was wrong, as it didn't matter what people clicked, I was getting Yes as a response.

9. Have you ever bought comic books in order to scan them?Amount
Yes19 (53%)
No17 (47%)
Total36

9a. If so, how many?Amount
A) 1-54 (21%)
B) 5-103 (16%)
C) 10-203 (16%)
D) 20-503 (16%)
E) more than 500 (0%)
F) More than 1001 (5%)
G) More than 2005 (26%)
Total19

10. What type of comic books did you buy to scan,
and roughly how many from each age group?
0 to 2526 to 5051 to 7576 to 100TotalNo
Percent
A) Books under 1 year old 22004 (15%)2
B) Books under 4 years old 11114 (15%)2
C) 1990 Books51028 (31%)1
D) 1980 Books31015 (19%)3
E) 1970 Books10001 (4%)3
F) 1960 Books10102 (8%)3
G) 1950 Books00000 (0%)3
H) 1940 Books10001 (4%)0
I) 1930 books10001 (4%)0
Total15 (58%)5 (19%)2 (8%)4 (15%)2617

Again, No Percent are people that indicated what they scanned without a percentage.

11. Where do you buy them and by roughly
what percentage did you buy them there?
0 to 2526 to 5051 to 7576 to 100Total No
Percent
A) Local Comic Shop20035 (36%)9
B) Book store20002 (14%)2
C) Online Mail Order10056 (43%)4
D) Auction Site00011 (7%)3
E) Newsstand00000 (0%)2
F) Other00000 (0%)3
Total5 (36%)0 (0%)0 (0%)9 (64%)1423

Again, No Percent means they didn't indicate a percentage.

One question I wish I had asked was their country of origin. While I suspect most scanners live in USA/Canada, I'm did get e-mails from people saying they download because the US monthly comics don't come to their country, or it comes in some form they don't like. It's possible a significant number of downloaders are from outside USA/Canada.

That is the end of the Survey Results. Thank you and Good day.